What's The Lowest Possible Score In Mike Tyson's Punch Out?

[@Brolylomaniac]

I'm placing my bet on 267000 points

[@Papamanual]

FFS, I said low score not high score >:(

[@Brolylomaniac]

@@Papamanual I just saw this comment and realized I accidentally added an extra zero to the number... Whoops

[@Papamanual]

@@Brolylomaniac Well this is awkward... for you. Type less shit next time ❤

[@Dedicatedtolivinginthepast]

@@Brolylomaniac With that mistyped score, You must be Todd Rogers lol

[@chilldedede]

cringe gacha

[@Morgan423Z]

It must be unbelievably frustrating to fight a guy who turns into a phantom and dodges every shot you throw for rounds on end... and then drops you with one perfectly placed, kidney-shattering punch. Especially when he's ten weight classes smaller than you are.

[@lambtoken2708]

Little Mac has muscles, but he's unbelievably lightweight. They must be made of foam

[@diggyrobinson5859]

Little mac is somehow lighter than my skinny ass, my theory is that he has hollow bones

[@FurnaxIkki]

Ippo fights be like:

[@impartialknockback]

@@lambtoken2708he’s wearing a muscle suit full of cotton padding

[@DownTrodded]

No he’s just a little person guys he’s shorter then everyone thus begin lighter. Who would let a kid little person into the ring satan obviously who else would allows such fights and demonic abilities into boxing?

[@DouglasZwick]

I love how at 55:20, you get Super Macho Man crouching and turning into Soda Popinski before releasing his uppercut

[@Papamanual]

God tier editing tbh. Not everyone couldve made that work haha. Interestingly, even though both characters are pallette swaps of each other, they arent aligned in the exact same position during the fight.

[@justkita3890]

As someone who's never paid attention to the score in punch out, I'm going to say exactly 38610. Let's see how awful my score is in an hour...

[@charliegriswold1445]

Somehow only 2000 off the total. Pretty damn good

[@rorbee]

Low score Mac is my favorite boxer. He has his opponents analyzed down to the bone. He'll dodge and weave for 2 rounds and land one punch to end the fight. And in the next fight he can't dodge a punch to save his life, getting punched every time he lands a hit. Yet he still wins, every time. Somehow all his fights seem like they're pre-determined, but you never know what kind of Mac will show up. It is an honor to be a boxing spectator in this era. Low score Mac will always be my world champion.

[@329link]

This may be a bit off topic, but it's really amazing how well made this game is. Most NES games, even the big titles, have a lot of jank to them. Whether it's weird hitboxes, buggy graphics, or sprite flickering/lag, you'll find it everywhere. This game has so few issues that even speedrunners can barely bust its code. Tbh, I really don't like most NES games because they've mostly aged very poorly, but this is a huge exception. The only real "dated" things I can see are the lack of a level select (which is easily made moot with the password system) and the score counter. You could legitimately put this game on a store for 5 bucks (maybe with cleaned up sprites like the video) and it'd feel like it was made today. It's a marvel of game design.

[@Papamanual]

Im glad you appreciate the game!

[@TurboGhast.]

On a similar note, the scoring system is much less vestigial than normal for a game without a scoreboard (and scoring mechanics deep enough to justify one) because whether you win by decision is based on your score.

[@Davian2073]

I don't know why the console just lags and crashes when there are more than 5 enemies on screen in The Legend of Zelda. I can't play The Legend of Zelda if it will be crashing all the while! Most of the rooms to defeat 10 enemies to continue through the dungeon...

[@beyondhaircraze4418]

It’s weird just how few many glitches every punch out game has, and how they’re either useless or needed in some very specific category.

[@SmugLookingBarrel]

Now that I've finished watching, I'm going to make another bold prediction. I predict that this video was only a prelude, the calm before the storm, a video to establish background information before the main event, which is trying to figure out the highest possible scores. In your TAS video you, said that the full TAS speedrun wasn't even close to the hardest thing you've done, and looking at this, I don't think it's this either, but now that we already know how exactly to get points, and we know a way to refill a bit of HP by punching and that it works for enemies as well, something tells me this was just the beginning.

[@Papamanual]

Good instincts. I just want to clarify it was McHazard who made the speedrun TAS, not me. I only made the video about it.

[@underrated1524]

Let's see, since win by decision is off the table, each foe needs to be knocked out at least once. So that immediately gives us 14 * 1010 = 14140 as a lower bound. And not every foe can be beaten in one knockdown - if we imagine that, on average, each opponent takes 2 knockdowns, this would give us an estimate of 28280 points, disregarding other sources of points. So I'll give a broad guess of 30000 points total to give some room for 10 points per punch adding up.

[@SerpiaXerma]

As mentioned in the intro, it is physically impossible to complete the game with zero points, as hitting an opponent in any way gains a point. Therefore, mathematically, 0 points is the worst guess, and I should be pinned for this glorious achievement in scientific problem solving.

[@wah9928]

Now that you meantion that, it is actually impossible to have your score end with the number 1-9, so anything ending with that, would be an equally bad guess

[@SerpiaXerma]

Ah, I see you are a fellow scholar of science. Welcome, your contributions are appreciated here.

[@TheGreatKingChiba]

You will always have a score of 0 if you never actually play the game, Schrodinger's Cat style. You could take it further and seek out a sealed copy that has never once been booted if you want to go the extra mile to ensure it has NEVER had a score over 0 on the cartridge aswell.

[@SerpiaXerma]

I'm so very pleased we can all come together as an intellectual collective to invent new and unique ways to achieve terrible predictions

[@Derkosson]

Negative scores, as well as scores too big to enter the memory space allocated to keeping track of the score should be just as impossible.

[@NekaSulia]

next thing I'd like to know is what is the highest possible score? I mean, you can only score so many points before the opponents will go down, so there has to be a max points limit, right?

[@Papamanual]

You are right... There are fundamental limits on what the maximum score score could be... I have a TAS that I have not unveiled yet. When I think the time is ready, there will be a video on it.

[@wompastompa3692]

I'm placingy bet on 26700 points.

[@whitty9877]

you copied the pinned comment@@wompastompa3692

[@GuanlongX]

Placing my bet at 3,333,360

[@Kosmicd12]

very satisfying ending. Excellent video game science, Pap!

[@MetalSandshrew]

My guess for the lowest score is 5.51 seconds. Not sure why Twin Galaxies removed that record...

[@gwainexe9065]

wut?

[@solknuckles2408]

I find it strange that I'm so interested in the depths of a game I've never played, and looks like a game I probably wouldn't enjoy playing. I think I like the theorhetical aspects of it and the ways that math is used to maximize (or minimize) different categories of efficiency. Ik most speedruns do that with frame-saving techniques, but that sort of math is a fundamental part of the gameplay itself, and is therefore more visible and interesting. Can't wait to see a high score video.

[@Max_Casetera]

14:23 I love that you used this theme again, its like it is king hippo song. Btw the whole music in this video is top notch, great work man, love your content 👑

[@gm_matthew]

I’m going to guess around 40,000. One knockdown for Glass Joe, King Hippo and Piston Honda II, two knockdowns for Don Flamanco I, and three for everyone else gives 35 knockdowns total; that’s 35,000 points. I reckon about 500 punches total for another 5,000 points EDIT: forgot about the Bald Bull II one hit KO

[@timothymclean]

To, my initial guess was around 20,000. I revised that to around 50,000 after the von Kaiser fight, when I realized that most fights would need multiple knockdowns, and down to 40,000 after the King Hippo fight. I wound up being a bit high, but in my defense I expected that Mike Tyson and Mr. Sandman would take extra points. I never would've guessed that Soda Popinski was the biggest roadblock!

[@IzumiChenmeiru]

My guess right after the rundown would be average of 2 knockdowns per fighter (28280), and just round up a bit to account for the majority of punches and maybe the odd star knockdown and I'd guess right around 35,000 points

[@SirJoelsuf1]

It's funny, I always thought that the runs of this game that revolve around points tend to resemble actual boxing matches: Either drawn out fights lots of dodging with a few crucial hits ending the fight (low score), or all out slugfests that are still drawn out (high score).

[@eggs8021]

I know literally nothing about this game, so I'm sure my guess is perfect 200,000 Edit: the points are not going up as much as I thought they might

[@RabbitEarsCh]

Spectacular work. I had no idea about the double hit mechanic, and this is just such a fascinating challenge.

[@AceZephyr1]

yeah idk mate. probably like a billion

[@alansmithee183]

Pap, love how you analyze the game in so many different ways. Always a pleasure watching your vids.

[@ThaRixer]

I'm going for 16020. Hope i don't low ball it

[@ThaRixer]

I'm at Von Kaiser, and fuck me i lowballed it hard

[@Buffalax]

Thanks for this awesome video bub!!!

[@Papamanual]

This should be your category lol... Lowest scores biggest times.

[@alphax4785]

Min KO points 14,140 Min TKO points 42,420 Guaranteed 1x KO's that I know of: Joe, Hippo, Honda 2. So with all that said, my guess is around 37k'ish adding that most are not perfect KO's / TKO's balanced by not knowing all the KO's which of course saves a ton of points.

[@alphax4785]

Watched, got decently close!

[@TehAwesomer]

So into this exploration of game rules and math via TAS. Subbed!

[@SmugLookingBarrel]

As requested, posting my guess blind before I see the fights, and here's my thought process: You say a regular punch is 10 points, from previous videos we know it does 5 damage, and enemies have 96 HP, so if you regular punch an enemy 19 times, plus one more to deal 1 damage, you'll knock them down once. You get 1010 points for a knockdown and need 3 for a TKO, so that's 10 times 19 plus 1000 is , 1190, times 3 is 3570, so that's my guess for the lowest score on any fight that doesn't have a one hit knockdown. On those fights, it would just be 3030, and on the three fights that have a one hit KO (glass joe, piston 2, bull 2), just 1010. So in total I'm guessing 1010 joe 3570 Kaiser, Piston 1, Don, Hippo 3030 Tiger 3030 Bull 1 1010 Piston 2 3750 Soda 1010 Bull 2 3750 Don 2 3750 Sandman 3750 Macho 3030 Tyson For a total of 39090 being the minimum possible score. Let's see if I'm right!

[@00F]

Score is one of those parts of Punch-Out I never really considered when playing through it. Though if I remember correctly, its used to determine a win by decision. If that's the case, then I wonder what the lowest possible score is if you are able to play through all fights and win by decision (except for King Hippo probably).

[@anyth11ng_]

I was also curious about this since the video mentioned the value for Glass Joe but not the other fighters. According to the Punch-Out!! fandom wiki, this is the win by decision point list: Glass Joe - 5,000 Von Kaiser - 8,000 Piston Honda 1 - Can't win by decision Don Flamenco 1 - 10,000 King Hippo - Can't win by decision Great Tiger - 10,000 Bald Bull 1 - Can't win by decision Piston Honda 2 - 3,000 Soda Popinski - 10,000 Bald Bull 2 - 7,000 Don Flamenco 2 - 5,000 Mr. Sandman - Can't win by decision Super Macho Man - Can't win by decision Mike Tyson - 5,000 So ignoring the fights where the referee always decides in the opponent's favor, it would be a total of 63,000 points.

[@cyanideytcuriousseadoggo]

@@anyth11ng_Lmao that’s 5 fights where Mario will announce an unfair judges decision. 4 more than a redditor’s braincell count

[@airmanon7213]

​@cyanideytcuriousseadoggo I think a couple of them (Piston Honda I, Bald Bull 1, and Super Macho Man) can be justified as the opponents being champions and therefore referee rules in the defender's favor for those fights. The others, I don't know.

[@UfoLoche]

I'm a simple man, I hear Gundam Build Fighters music, I like the video. Also great work, love the vid!

[@virginiacanfield2307]

What a beautifully put together video! I love the music. Thank you for working hard :)

[@coltranebartlett590]

Way better title! Good job 👍 can't wait to watch this

[@lordarcyus2862]

Idk, probably at least 6 or something. Feels hard to get much lower, maybe 5 with good rng

[@Nirakolov]

something neat about Don Flaminco 2... when he does a hook he has a very clear 'worried' face, I just thought that was a nice touch

[@coffinrodriguez3150]

Love the Spyro music to close out the video ♥️

[@wafflebroz]

Seeing a “Low Score” category could be exciting to watch

[@yellowdicesam]

technically 2240 on don 1 is possible using clockstop (might go lower if you can double hit on hooks, might test that later) but yeah clockstop is obviously a banned glitch. rapid punch storage was used though and idk the ruling on that lol

[@SuperCosmicSpaceMagnet]

I'm guessing 5000 points, because TAS is magic and I believe in the power of foreshadowing!

[@Papamanual]

I like that reasoning.

[@GrannySingaporePVP]

Wtaf! I’m subbed AND have the bell on and somehow I’m 4 days late to the party. Oh well, new Pap video is a good time regardless of how late I find it

[@Papamanual]

youtube screwing us over again :((( lol

[@KumongaStrikes]

I was gonna check this video out via the livestream, but couldn’t start watching until a little later. By that time, the video was on the start of the Von Kaiser fight. Glad I didn’t start on Glass Joe. It was too easy to figure out what his lowest score would be. Lol

[@TheGlitched64]

This channel is just proof that you can get so much entertainment out of a single NES game, and relay that to so many people. Always here for it, and for the other stuff too like the medievil video. Also knowing nothing about Punch-Out scores and pausing after the first 2 fights, imma throw my guess out and say 43,000. About 3k each average with a 4k on Tyson. Allow me to regret this comment about 20 minutes later when I see the real score be like... 15,000 or something.

[@petelee2477]

Just got to bald bull and so far you are about right.

[@2-Way_Intersection]

i just wanna say, i love how to go with the other boxers having their wii artwork, mike tyson just has a picture

[@BrianM_3rd]

Tony Hawk music makes an immediate impression the video is gonna be good :) Excellent music choices throughout! Made for some lovely dinner-time watching. Nice to hear some non-NA voices as well for a chance, the Oz cadence makes for a much more easy going watch!

[@SomeGuy712x]

I guessed 35000, and wow, I was surprisingly close. Nice job managing to eke out a sub-36K score in the end!

[@decorativewingdings]

My headcanon is that Mr. Sandman's real name is Sandra

[@davidbailis8415]

Sandra Sandman?

[@zubizuva]

The next thing I’d like to see is a fewest knockouts run. Win every fight by decision except for the five that you have to win by KO.

[@Papamanual]

This'd be interesting. Making sure I win as fast as possible but also meeting the requirements to win via decision. So I have to beat glass joe as fast as possible, but also get atleast 5000 points.

[@nekotheliar6393]

Neko's bet is on Bowser crashing though the roof thinking Princess Peach is here and break the score counter on his way in

[@poochyenarulez]

good video. I'm glad youtube recommended it.

[@dbeast03]

Alright, well I'm a fan of the game for sure, but my memory isn't exactly fine tuned to speedrun level, so these estimates are probably off in all directions, but here's my first thoughts in generalizing each fighter: I know that some fights can be won by decision while some can't, and I believe those scores need to be *at most* 10k. So, my first thought is that every fight is probably way under 10k points, but because we need knockdowns, they probably can't be any less than 3400 or so (barring a couple of OHKOs). So . . . per fight we're looking at maybe an average of 4000 points? I guess that puts my total at 56,000 points total, but just in case somebody follows that logic or just picks 56k by chance, Imma go a bit under, at 55,420 because I can. (Note, I did edit this because I for some reason mixed up the 500 and 1010 despite Pap saying which was which. Ok NOW second edit will be at the end of the video) See ya at the end of the video 👍 Alright, well, my guess weren't the worst, but I know where I went wrong. I overestimated how many punches the fighters could take (by a lot) and forgot a couple OHKDs. That said, I also overestimated the 3x OHKD fights thinking you needed a normal knockdown and greatly overestimated Sandman and Tyson in particular, as I sorta expected them to offset the OHKO fights. But hey, only about 60% high isn't terrible, so I'll take it. Great video as always btw, love me a good challenge run

[@spawner8478]

Ill be back in 28hours

[@koolguy5483]

Are you back

[@gorillachronicles]

This guy's just like my dad

[@spawner8478]

i go the milk@@gorillachronicles

[@thatguysavetf2916]

MrSandman is actually incredibly easy once you figure out that the “My turn” cheese from punch out wii transfers over. There’s also the fact that soda popinski gets fully screwed over by the block button

[@spimbles]

INSTANT like and full watch just for using that THPS menu music at the beginning lol such an underrated groovy track im betting on... somewhere between 15k and 20k points by the end 🤔

[@ExcuseZero]

You mean to tell me I got halfway through the game as a kid?! Now I need to play again and beat it

[@BSGRIND]

Great video like always Pap❤

[@UntarLaManteca]

That thumbnail goes so hard

[@OllieAndFriends-23]

272622700 points?

[@Milshot]

I'm going to guess around 38000 points after watching your video on the fewest punches required. I'm guessing it'll be somewhere around there because of the one hit KOs on some of the fights which is only 1010 points per fight. But I'm ready to be surprised

[@AndromedasCartoon]

okay, hear me out, you find an ACE exploit and set the score to -65,535 using that

[@AryaPlus]

ACE is absolutely cheating in challenge runs, it's basically hacking but TECHNICALLY not-

[@AndromedasCartoon]

@@AryaPlus forgot to specify but this was a joke lol

[@thatoneguywhoworksatjoespl9701]

Probably somewhere in the 40 thousand range? It's also entirely possible there's some crazy glitch I don't know about to reduce score, so I'll go with 20,000!

[@vappycat]

Late to the party as i am, I'm thinking 25,000. Love this content, btw. I couldnt beat Bald Bull 1 if i tried myself but it's fun to see people absolutely tear this game apart. It's so interestingly made. Edit: oh man I was so scared it was gonna be stuck at the 010 and I'm so glad you got lower, I'm really impressed with how this was pulled off

[@zoliking]

Respect for using SC music. Epic.

[@snezzzz]

i just realized i was watching this for an HOUR

[@PaulsPubAndBrew]

Excellent, appreciate all your hard work. Question from the chat - In a first frame double punch, what if both boxers would hit zero? I assume Mac goes down?

[@calook1334]

From what I know, they both go down, but Mac is counted off first.

[@Papamanual]

Only little Mac goes down, even if the opponents health is reduced to 0. If you get up, the fight will resume with the opponent at 0 health - which is effectively 1 health since you need to land 1 more hit to knock him down.

[@SpathiCaptainFwiffo]

​@@Papamanualwhat is you get Mac back down to 1 health and perform yet another double hit?

[@Accrovideogames]

To make things simpler, here's how the game actually calculates points. Punch: 10 Star Punch: 500 Get Star: 100 Knockdown: 1000 The reason why you get 110 points each time you get a star is because you also get the 10 points for the punch itself. In the same way, knockdown points are combined with punch points.

[@stargoob]

I have never played this game, love these types of videos.

[@twinstarMD]

Cool vid, Pap!

[@thatguystar817]

Man I think..... 10 points? On glass joe because he's such a Chad

[@koytru]

I'm guessing... around e points

[@korhol2065]

I can’t bet I’m still trying to comprehend the face mike Tyson is giving me and I fear for my health and safety

[@idontwantahandlethough]

great vid dude (as per usual)

[@tylerlarsen1842]

32:30 Ace Combat Zero music, absolutely wonderful!

[@Mobius14]

How about the question of: whats the Mike Tyson Punch Out run with the least RNG calls? As in if there are ways to remove "RNG calls" or skip RNG punches by the opponent. Whats the least Mike Tyson punch RNG run?

[@Papamanual]

Thats sort of interesting i suppose. I would focus on lots of fights where winning as fast as possible is key (so like the TAS speedrun) but also focussing on maximum damage out put on a single section of fight without triggering other RNG events (random stars and patterns etc) So dodge and countering Honda 1's uppercut and countering would be good since you get to counter like 10 times for a total of 32 damage. (Although basically all the uppercuts are random) It would be difficult to figure out a definitive answer. I might look into it at some point, but most of the fights i think would be the same as the TAS speedrun.

[@terrygarner7783]

I know how to get no points on soda Popinski's hooks. Just simply don't even hit him after he does his hook.

[@Papamanual]

How are you going to win then?

[@encryptedprinter3289]

I never realized how much I needed punch-golf in my life.

[@adventureoflinkmk2]

I'd say around 80000 points, remember theres five fighters where its impossible to decision win

[@evidence2839]

three hundred and twelve duodecillian, factorial

[@cookiesversuscream]

All of these "worst" guesses are so pedestrian-why restrict your domain to the positive integers if you're purposefully going for the most outlandish value possible? So here's my guess: e^(i*pi)

[@Papamanual]

NEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEERD

[@vonkaiserandgun]

5. Place don flamenco 2 with 3,250 points 4. Place von kaiser with 3,340 points 3. Place super macho man with 3,380 points 2. Place mr.sandman with 3,510 points 1. Place soda popinski with 3,520 I didn't expect von kaiser to be on thist list but im happy because von kaiser is my Favourite Punch out Character

[@maximyllion]

i love how glass joe and honda 1 are basically free while kaiser is a road block here

[@dviesel2604]

Awesome job comrade. Shall we consider a low score speedrun category?

[@IronHulkTriathlon]

Don Flamenco can be optimized by doing the alternating punches, which can result in a 10 count, no?

[@KornPop96]

Legend says Pap will still read and like comments on 4 month old videos

[@Papamanual]

Legends come true

[@isprobablyjobhunting]

Been looking forward to this.

[@phet1211]

“About that 1 ko I have, I’m about to make it 2” is the coolest line for any fighter to do and you gave it to FUCKING GLASS JOE lmao

[@Papamanual]

Glass Joe is a badass jk

[@dethaddr]

Since double hits damage both fighters... i wonder if you can get a double TKO?

[@craftyrobandicootproductio1424]

A double TKO is impossible in all games. You can only trade in SNES and Wii.

[@dethaddr]

@@craftyrobandicootproductio1424 ever try it? I'm wondering if there's any opponent it could be theoretically possible on. Then again, if you didn't have Mac get up, I wonder if you can double KO... LOL?

[@craftyrobandicootproductio1424]

@@dethaddr Breakdown: NES: Simultaneous hits can never occur SNES: Both simultaneous hits and knockdowns can happen unless TKO. Wii: Only simultaneous hits.

[@dethaddr]

@@craftyrobandicootproductio1424 is that simultaneous can never occur or simultaneous knockdowns are hard-coded to never occur, because this video PROVES simultaneous hits CAN happen on NES. Might have had it happen once or twice in my youth, but never really paid attention to it until now.

[@craftyrobandicootproductio1424]

@@dethaddr It never does damage. It does, however the sprite of damage taken by both sides

[@damiencouturee6240]

Damn, the tony hawk music really made the nostalgia hit lol

[@JohnDVil]

I think using stars could have reduced on some fighters, what is better, a 1 star punch knock out, or a normal tko?

[@Papamanual]

There are no 1 star knockouts

[@UmongusSussehFrusseh]

40:02 great music Btw it'd be interesting to see a video all about double hits. I notice that Don Flamenco takes 5 damage from double hits. So, is it possible for Mac and Don to knock each other down at the same time?

[@Papamanual]

Double knockdowns are impossible, the opponent will remain standing with 0 health.

[@ForSquirel]

LBH, if anyone knows how to do this, its mPap. This is beautiful.

[@leftysheppey]

I'm gonna guess 200,000 Glass Joe needing 5k is my guess that they range between 5k and 20k

[@PoeticProphetic]

I love the OCD triggers over 10 extra points

[@doctorprepologedyedeyadede3542]

I'm guessing 36,000ish Why the fuck did that work

[@CaptainJoosh]

My guess is 90.000, thereabouts.

[@ForumArcade]

StarCraft Zerg music. 👍

[@FlipKips]

Already pretty invested in your video. I’d say 98,000 points

[@varietychan]

What's weird is the fact that that there is points at all, like, what's the point (no pun intended)

[@Papamanual]

many NES/SNES era games have some sort of point system basically because it was used in Arcade game leaderboards and seemed like a good design choice. Aside from that generality, Points in this game determine if you win by decision if the fight goes the distance against most opponents.

[@suprmanjim]

Negative 69420 points with emojis and letters with them for each punch and boxer with senpai changing the points

[@kevinmorris9362]

Pre-video guess: Minimum points is somewhere around 10,000. Edit: I don't know where my head was at. Not even CLOSE.

[@wyattcrosby9558]

75,000 because 5000•12=60000 with 25% leaway

[@mikedrop4421]

This has gotta be the most frustrating way to complete the game.

[@dabreadmaker7109]

That thumbnail is heat 🔥🔥🔥